Brought to you by a back-handed Bitch-slap from karma

As I think of all the young girls in my life who I love - so many of them like me - I think of the many many many mistakes I made when I was around their age, and how desperately I want to save them from all the heartaches and regrets I experienced. Then I remember all the women who felt the same way watching me grow up. Did I listen to them? Hell no! Will the girls out there listen to me? I don't know, but I'll never know if I don't try to talk to them. I hope they will, or that my words will at least linger in the back of their heads until the day they need them.My slutty-ass generation set a pretty low standard for the succeeding one, but this generation comes up with crap that just appalls me, and makes anyone with a shred of morality terrified to have a daughter in this world. I never noticed at the time I was growing up how sexually-oriented all the television shows and movies we watched were. By the age of eight my favorite movie was A Fish Called Wanda, and it still is, so I was used to seeing pretty raunchy stuff. Why was I allowed to watch movies like that? Because my parents have fantastic and sick senses of humor. Plus they know kids aren't stupid. Even so, being prepared and already exposed to sexual and vulgar humor or content doesn't make you aware of the fact that you're not only being desensitized to something you shouldn't be, but they're actually gearing you to think its normal.My friend Stacy has two daughters, both who reminded me of my smart-assed self, especially the older one. When she began dating her first boyfriend in high school, I was horrified and heartbroken to hear that not only were her friends pressuring her AND her boyfriend to have sex, but they would tease her because she hadn't done it yet. Had they? No! They just wanted a sacrificial lamb who could tell THEM what it was like. Then I thought back to when I was in her shoes and the memories came back of my "friends" doing the exact same crap to me, pressuring me to get it over with so I could tell them about it.I find it crazy that movies and television try to make it look like it's a huge deal to be a virgin: it's so "lame" and somehow everyone knows you are one. Then you grow up. You go out into the real world and you realize that virgins have almost become a precious commodity. By the time you meet your husband you know enough to realize that the guys who matter never cared about your "experience," or lack there of, and they never wanted you to have a "number" (and certainly not one more than you can count on one hand). The people who are worthy of your time and love aren't going to care about trashy shit like that...let the people who would care go to hookers.Take my word for it, please...when you do find the right one, you are going to wish you'd made a lot fewer mistakes, like zero. When I (re)met my sister-in-law and realized you really could wait until marriage I thought "Oh shit. That kind of self-restraint was actually possible?! Man, I wish I would have known that!"There is so much pressure coming at kids from other kids, from Hollywood (a cesspool of evil in itself), and from social media that they seem to think they have to get rid of their virginity, to cast it off like some curse they were born with. Well, kids, from someone who was under the same misguided impression: your virginity is a precious gift, something God hopes you will wait to give to your spouse. He will always love you even if you don't wait, but it's something you'll miss someday when you no longer have it.Then I think about all the new stuff this generation has to contend with that mine did not. First of all, the only celebrity sex tape we knew about was Pam and Tommy Lee's. Sorry Pam...that's always gonna be there. But now it seems like a rite of passage for some of these tramps who want to be more famous than they ever deserved to be. Feel entitled to fame? Granddaddy built a hotel empire? Daddy was one of O.J.'s Dream Team? Well, just splay your legs for the camera and say "Oh, oops!" when some sleaze bucket leaks it to the media. Then watch the attention roll in. These are the role models our daughters and nieces DON'T need to have. They should turn up their noses at these people, and with any luck they will.And feeding into the trash magnet of the world is the worst creation my generation didn't have to deal with: Social Media. The bane of every parent's existence. If it were up to me, you wouldn't even be able to get a Facebook page or any other until you were at least 17...then parents wouldn't have to listen to the whines of "But I'm the only kid in school who doesn't have one!" When I was going through tough times in school, as everyone does, at least I could go home and get away from the problems. Bullies couldn't touch you at home. But now kids are getting bullied worse on social media, and worse than that, the pressure and teasing over being a virgin is worse on social media!! And girls kill themselves over this senseless crap!! It's awful! Whenever I hear about someone being teased for being a virgin I start to see red. That has got to be the stupidest insult you could possibly come up with. Oh, no! She has more self-respect and restraint than you?? She'll be admired more by the people who matter while you're reviled?? OH, NO! I was the maddest I could get when I heard that an older cousin was teasing a younger one because she was 18 and still a virgin. That should be commended!! I couldn't believe she was trying the same crap on a new generation. What, do you want her to be as used-up and miserable as you?! Just because you're beautiful doesn't mean you should be having sex, or even having boyfriends. In fact, being beautiful means you should learn to value and respect yourself, because the wrong people are often going to come to you, and you need to be ready to turn them away.On the topic of being beautiful: [Trigger Warning to the self-absorbed...and if you actually expect people to give you "trigger warnings" and "safe zones" then yes, you are self-absorbed.] EVERY WOMAN IS BEAUTIFUL!! EVERY GIRL IS BEAUTIFUL, AND THEY ALL DESERVE TO FEEL BEAUTIFUL!! I can't believe how mean and vicious girls and women are to each other. They were when I was growing up and they still are. It seems to come naturally to be catty and tear down other girls to make yourself feel better. It's truly pathetic. Then you go through some of life's struggles and realize how important it is that women stand together and up for each other.My great-grandmother was a stage actress and suffragette. I have always been so proud of the strong woman she was, and the strong girls she raised and influenced, as they made me strong and taught me self-respect. But I hardly think my mother's Nonni and those other women fought the fight they did to gain more freedoms for us just so the ensuing generations could turn around and be assholes to each other. They stood together for women's rights and we need to stand together for women's self-respect. We need to build each other up, not tear each other down.And ladies, you know that bitch Karma I keep harping on about? Oh, she's a-watching. Think that other woman's husband looks better than yours? Think it's okay to gang up on the shy girl at work so you can feel better? Well someday Karma's going to pay you back, and it may be in a way you never envisioned. And someday you may need another woman to have your back, and she won't be there. In this world we are still the "weaker" sex (my husband would say "fairer," because he's a smart man and he knows we're better, but weaker works for this purpose), but when we stand together and up for each other we're stronger. We already know we're stronger internally...so quit caving to peer pressure and vanity and start sticking up for what is right: sticking together. Women go through so much shit in this world, and we need to be able to lean and rely on one another, not worry if we can trust one another. The girls I know will always have me to lean and rely on when they need me.

Ten years ago today the boy in that picture was happy, full of life, and enjoying my 21st birthday party...while Mom and I waited in the ER. I think about him often, especially on Halloween: There when I got out of the hospital, I had joked that I was going to go trick-or-treating with him and his sister that night. Who could turn away a handicapped 20-year-old in a wheelchair anyway? He was excited when it was time to go out, hoping I would still go with them. Exhausted from an eventful day and restless last night in the hospital, however, I told him I was going to stay home.No matter! When he got home he plopped down on the sofa next to me with his bag of goodies and asked what my favorite candy was. Why, Reese's peanut butter cups, of course! He began digging around, pulling them out, and sweetly unwrapping and handing them to me, knowing it would be frustrating for my newly one-armed self to try. I tried to stop him, knowing he loved them too, but he was not to be deterred. "What else do you like," he wanted to know. I told him I'd always loved Smarties and Bottle Caps, and again he began pulling them out and unwrapping them for me. That kid stuffed my stomach full of his hard-earned candy until I couldn't eat anymore. He was just a really sweet kid, and he always cracked my mom up.That's why it makes me so sad to think that though he was enjoying my party ten years ago today, it was less than three years ago that he was killed on his street bike, only 18 at the time. I have seen so many people die before their time, and watched so many friends mourn the loss of a loved one. I always try to remember that the ones called Home early are the lucky ones, while we have to stay here in this shitty world. I know that thought brings hollow comfort to the ones left behind, still envisioning all they had wanted for their dearly departed. That's why I try to keep in mind and pass on two quotes from Harry Potter (where else?) that have brought me immense comfort.The first is in line with my previous thoughts, when Dumbledore told Harry "Do not pity the dead. Pity the living, and above all, those who live without love."That quote rings so true, and I love it as much as when Sirius Black tells Harry "The ones who love us never truly leave us." That one has proven true time and time again, as I can always feel the comforting love of my grandparents around me, especially if I'm talking to or thinking of them.I was at my best friend Jaena's parents' house when I noticed her younger cousin Tess had that quote tattooed on her forearm. When I saw the quote, I began tapping the tattoo wildly, excited she had been as affected by it as I had. I love Tess; she's like another little cousin to me, and a lot like me. We were all heartbroken for her when she lost her mother and beloved grandmother back-to-back, right at the time in her life when a girl really needs her mom. That was the only time I've seen Jaena cry, when she lost her aunt and grandmother. Fortunately for Tess, her mom had 3 sisters who have been able to be there for her, but she will always miss her mom.As I think about Hunter today, if I get sad, I'll try to remember not to pity him, but the mother and sisters left to live without the boy they adored so much. And for their sake, I'll remember that he never truly left them. May God be with them, and all of you as you face life's heartaches and struggles.

I was just realizing we are but two days from the ten-year anniversary of when these pictures were taken! While last year was the ten-year anniversary of Karma's first strike, this year is the ten-year anniversary of my ill-fated 21st birthday party.You see, my parents really wanted to make up for the crummy 20th birthday, and though we'd discussed all going to the F1 Grand Prix in Indianapolis (as it used to fall on or around my birthday), I said I really just wanted to have a big party to thank everybody who had supported me so much through it all. My parents planned an amazing, beautiful party and so many people chipped in. A man my father was doing business with catered the party, and his gift to me was a big, beautiful ice sculpture, lit from the inside, that had "Happy Birthday J.P." carved on the front. That's it in the top 2 pictures, with my Daddy in orange. My wonderful Aunt Mike (one of the top interior designers on the east coast) and Uncle Rob came down from Virginia to create dozens of gorgeous flower arrangements and spruce everything up perfectly. To make it truly perfect, they surprised me with my cousin Jordy- who had been a sister and best friend more than a cousin for a long time. That's her beautiful, smiling face next to me on the sofa, with my hair almost past the "pixie" phase. Most of my Texas family had come down, and people were coming from all over. It was all going so perfectly according to plan. Too perfectly...

I was so excited that Mom had to order me to go get dressed and try to relax before the party. I was in my room doing as she asked. I had just talked to an old friend and ex-boyfriend, Patrick, who needed directions to the party. I went over to my computer to change the song that was playing, and looked out the window over the lake out back. I could hear the music already playing outside- a friend of ours, Leon, had been the DJ at Mike & Tiff's 80's engagement party, and had offered to DJ for my birthday. As I stood at my desk looking out, all of a sudden everything went numb, then limp, then...nothing.

Mom soon got a call from Patrick. He needed more directions, and couldn't get ahold of me. She went back to check on me and found a sight that would make any mother's blood run cold...much less my mother.I was unconscious on the floor, my head under the bed.The next thing I remember is lying on my bed, with Mom and Aunt Mike over me, trying to talk to me. I tried to talk back, but everything came out jumbled, slurred, and messed up. My brain was getting over being fried: I'd had a seizure.They had called for an ambulance, and after talking it over I decided I'd feel better if I went to the ER. No one had been there when it happened, so we didn't know if I had hit my head. On top of that, I knew I had gone into a seizure with the first aneurysm hemorrhage, and was scared there could be bleeding in my brain.So, I told everyone to stay and enjoy the party: I had wanted to throw it for them anyway. After saying "Happy Birthday Jessica, you had a seizure" for Uncle Rob's video camera, I climbed on the stretcher and left for the hospital. Luckily Uncle Rob took video and pictures of everything, so I could see everyone enjoying the bars, food, and beautiful set-up under the tents. The video also has a wonderful rendition of everyone singing "Happy Birthday" - including the EMTs (one of whom I often saw at church afterward).I'm so glad to have all the pictures and video, because Mom and I spent the whole party in the ER!!!!!I loved my neurologist, he was a very sweet man...but Mom could have kicked his ass for choosing that time to try to change my seizure medication! Both of my seizures since I'd gotten out of the hospital had been due to a lack of or change in seizure medications, so I wasn't changing anymore!!At that time doctors still thought of Keppra as a seizure medication to be used in conjunction with others, but they were starting to realize that it worked very well on its own for some patients. The other medication he tried to switch me to made me feel physically awful, so after this little fiasco I knew that Keppra was the drug for me. FYI: no matter what anyone tells you, you are never ever supposed to just go off of Keppra. Like so many drugs, you have to wean off.Our friend Joe had a similar experience when he tried to switch from Keppra to something else. I don't think he had a seizure, but it made him feel terrible- and he's a true epileptic. Other drugs also turned my friend Stacy's daughter into a miserable-feeling zombie. All three of us are happily back on Keppra, any side-effects be damned! Depression and suicidal thoughts??!! Well hell, I'm gonna deal with those anyway...what do I care if the seizure meds make them worse??!! 🤔

About 3 years before the stroke. That's me on the left, my sister-in-law Tiffani in the middle, and Teri - the friend who probably saved my life by being out partying with me the night before and morning of my 20th birthday - on the right. This was at a Porsche event in Houston's Uptown Park, where some of Dad's Porsches were part of the display.

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This is just some of the debt I racked up with Karma. I don't even have a picture of the white BMW 328i Dad surprised me with at school when I was 15. I got this Audi TT for my 16th birthday, and this was my first weekend of track time. Karma struck pretty quick when the car was stolen about a year later, but then Dad let me have his 405 hp Corvette Z06, so...ya know...

The above picture is from a little over 2 months after I got out of the hospital, holding my friend's baby. I was having fun with the spiky hair phase, but the pixie phase was the most fun, until it got back to "long" again! 😊 The second picture is of that same baby and me over 2 years later...happy to be able to make a ponytail again! Of course, I can't make my own ponytail with my one good arm, someone else has to do it for me.

I am embarrassed and ashamed that I forgot to mention the most important fact about the mother of the little boy in those pictures, my good friend Kim. It's a part of the book, but I neglected to mention it here. I was living in Phoenix in October 2008 when I got a mass text from our friend Brandy, asking us all to pray for our friend Kim, as she'd had a brain aneurysm hemorrhage. I had just seen her in April, when that second picture was taken. I hadn't wanted to move away without seeing them, so I had gone over to visit a couple days before moving to Phoenix. Now she'd had an aneurysm hemorrhage??!! I was in shock. We were all stunned that it could happen a third time in such a young group, and I was terrified about the odds of her surviving when I'd already survived two...had I used up all the odds??!!! I was even more scared for those two boys that needed their mom, but fortunately she came through with less physical damage than me!! She has trouble with her memory, but I'm just glad she can move both arms!!​It seems fitting to me that I finally get this blog up and running when we’re T-minus one week away from the 11-year anniversary of my first stroke, which will of course also be Father’s Day and my 31st birthday, as well as one year since learning of the family who shares the sadder side of that anniversary with ours. There will be many things on my mind that day, the least of which isn’t my book, and how desperately I want to get it published so I can share the ups, downs, and benefits of the wisdom learned from the past 11 years. I’ll be able to reach so many more people beyond my own already-affected circle once it’s published, but I can also use this blog to reach people, pass on information to and educate others about what I’ve learned and continue to learn, and share inspiration and sympathy with others going through their own struggles. God bless you all, and feel free to comment and share!

I’ve recently started doing Bible Study plans on my Bible app on my iPhone. I’ll be honest, I hate many of the advancements in technology we have made, and I really despise this “social media” age we’re in, which gives people a false sense of togetherness and turns many into self-obsessed assholes who believe the world revolves around their little reality show lives. I’m probably what you would call a “self-hating blogger.” That’s ok, I can live with that. Every now and then, though, I discover something that makes me happy we have some of these advancements. Reconnecting through Facebook with the man I’m now married to after over twenty years apart was one reason to be happy that we had new ways of finding each other.The Study Plans in my Bible app are another positive result of these advancements. As someone who is on their fourth lap through their personal Bible, I’ve been reading different selections in my Oxford Annotated Bible (used for my Religious Studies courses), so I can learn more of the history of that time and other interesting facts from the footnotes (which are sometimes longer than the passages themselves) that I wouldn’t learn from another version. The plans in the Bible app let me study different sections in light of different topics, and often with helpful devotionals. The first plan I completed was for depression, something I’ve battled for over a decade, and which was once again haunting me recently. Now I’m on a plan created by Pastor Rick Warren about hearing the voice of God when He speaks to you. I have found comfort and enlightenment in both plans, but the former plan happened to include what is possibly my favorite Psalm, and I felt I should post it for others, as it can speak to you and bring comfort in troubling times, as it has so often for me: Have mercy on me,O God,because of your unfailing love.Because of your great compassion,blot out the stain of my sins.Wash me clean from my guilt.Purify me from my sin.For I recognize my rebellion;it haunts me day and night.Against you, and you alone, have I sinned;I have done what is evil in your sight.You will be proved right in what you say,and your judgement against me is just.For I was born a sinner –yes, from the moment my mother conceived me.But you desire honesty from the womb,teaching me wisdom even there.Purify me from my sins,and I will be clean;wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.Oh, give me back my joy again;you have broken me –now let me rejoice.Don’t keep looking at my sins.Remove the stain of my guilt.Create in me a clean heart, O God.Renew a loyal spirit within me.Do not banish me from your presence,and don’t take your Holy Spirit from me.Restore to me the joy of your salvation,and make me willing to obey you.Then I will teach your ways to rebels,and they will return to you.Forgive me for shedding blood, O God who saves;then I will joyfully sing of your forgiveness.Unseal my lips, O Lord,that my mouth may praise you.You do not desire a sacrifice, or I would offer one.You do not want a burnt offering.The sacrifice you desire is a broken spirit.You will not reject a broken and repentant heart, O God.Look with favor on Zion and help her;rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.Then you will be pleased with sacrifices offered in the right spirit –With burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings.Then bulls will again be sacrificed on your altar. -Psalm 51 (NLT)If you don’t already know it, here’s the backstory of that particular Psalm:David wrote it after committing adultery with Bathsheba (the mother of Solomon). In fact, David had been so captivated upon seeing Bathsheba bathing on a roof that he ordered her soldier husband to the front lines of the battle, ensuring his death (probably some of the “shed blood” that he begs forgiveness for). Once her husband was dead, David claimed his prize and took Bathsheba for his own, but was obviously plagued by guilt over his actions.After surviving my two hemorrhaged brain aneurysms, I spent a lot of time contemplating the various ways I’d racked up debt with Karma. And it wasn’t just all the damage I’d done to my own body. I may not have had a friend killed to get to her boyfriend, but I didn’t reject his advances, ultimately taking him as my own boyfriend, breaking the heart of a girl who was supposed to be my best friend at the time. She had been there for me during some very difficult times, when other friends had walked away from me, and I repaid her loyal kindness with betrayal and bitchiness. I often felt that in a way I saved her some trouble by taking that guy off her hands…I was the one who wound up going through a breakdown almost two years later when we broke up, and she never had to deal with his lies and douchebaggery. But really, there was no excuse for any of it, and I feel guilt for the way I treated her. I only hope that Jenny found better friends and has a happy life.It wasn’t just Jenny I thought of as I lay in my hospital bed, and for months after. I’d spent years jerking my best friend Bryan back-and-forth and hurting him, although I wasn’t actively trying to do so…I was just stupid. I thought about the ex-boyfriends I had wronged and hurt in my immaturity, as well as people I had been less than nice to at school. I had never been a bully, having been bullied myself often in private school, but there were still people I didn’t need to be such a bitch to. Some people needed it, others not so much.I knew that there was nothing I could do to make up for my past failings, though…in fact I kind of hoped that those I had wronged would feel they had gotten some retribution when they heard what had happened to me. If it makes them feel any better, Karma keeps tabs on me. I knew that the best thing I could do was pray and ask for forgiveness for the wrongs I had done throughout my life, and to try to do better from here on out. That is why I love that Psalm, and have it marked with a different color tab in my Bible so I can always easily find it.Anyone who has ever regretted something they did wrong, and regretted disappointing God in the process, can sympathize with how David felt when he composed that Psalm. You want the “stain” of your stupid mistakes erased from your record, and to start over again as a better person. In the same way it hurts more to disappoint your father than anger him, it hurts more to disappoint your Heavenly Father by doing something other than what He would have you do.The beauty that I’ve found in my own study of God’s Word and soul-searching is the loving forgiveness He continually gives us. Like the Prodigal Son and the one sheep out of 100 who strayed away, God will be even more overjoyed to regain those of His children who have sinned and gone astray from Him. He will always lovingly welcome you with open arms when you ask for forgiveness, joyous that you have returned. We are unworthy of His forgiveness, but in His forgiveness He deems us worthy of His love. Since I first felt God’s love and hand through my own survival of the impossible, His unfailing love has brought tears to my eyes many times. I only wish I could transfer that feeling to others who still have doubts that He’s there.

If my birthday doesn’t screw up one thing, it’s another! This year it falls on Father’s Day again, as it did the year I got hurt…something which my father lives in morbid trepidation of. That year, it had been a few summers since the two had fallen on the same day, and I was excited about it. Mom had a calendar in the kitchen on which she’d written “Father’s Day” and “Happy Birthday J.P.!” on the 19th. I had changed the J.P. to read “Just Perfect.” It amazes me that out of all the things I can’t remember from the 6 months or so leading up to my initial stroke, I actually remembered writing that the month of it.Doctors have explained that the reason you can retain older memories after a stroke or brain injury, but can’t recall things that happened in the days, weeks, or months leading up, is because it takes a certain amount of time for your brain to process and store something as an actual memory. I could easily regale my parents with memories of our “White Trash Christmas” from ’96, but couldn’t tell you what I had been doing the day before the stroke because my brain kerploded before it ever got to store anything from that day as a memory. Whenever I wrote that on the calendar, though, the memory was stored.I seem to remember Father’s Day falling on my birthday more often, but it must just be because it always falls near the same date. In my home state of Texas, June 19th is always a celebratory day anyway: Juneteenth (June 19th) celebrates the day all the slaves in Texas were finally freed (2 ½ years after the Emancipation Proclamation became official). It’s said to be the oldest known celebration of the ending of slavery in the United States; I was always so proud of the fact that I was born on the same day, and amazed when kids in other states knew nothing about the holiday. For someone who loves freedom, and feels it is the most important liberty all human beings deserve to possess, it was a great day to be born.For my dad, however, it is now a day to be feared, especially when it shares Father’s Day. According to the sources I could find, we first shared the day on my 3rd birthday in 1988, then again on my 9th birthday in 1994. After that fateful 20th birthday in 2005, Father’s Day again fell on my birthday in 2011, when I turned 26, and shall again this year on my 31st birthday and “11-year anniversary.”We weren’t going to celebrate my birthday on Father’s Day, but it presents a second complication this year, as it falls on the final day of the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Somehow my brother, who I didn’t believe ever missed a race, has missed it (or part of it) the past 2 years. I guess that’s the sort of thing that happens when you’re running after a 6-year-old all the time. We couldn’t allow him to miss the race again this year, though, prompting us to change our plans so that we can all celebrate on Sunday, after they’ve been to church and he’s seen the race. So, Dad will have to celebrate Father’s Day on my birthday again this year (HA!) …but at least next year it falls on my little cousin John’s birthday, the day before…and as he’s never allowed to get hurt, we should all be ok!I had so hoped to be able to tell my Daddy that I had a publisher for my book (or at least an agent helping me) when my birthday/Father’s Day/11-year anniversary happened this year…but that was when naiveté prevented me from knowing just how difficult of a process this can be. You think having a crazy story, an important message, and a completed manuscript is enough until you actually begin the process of looking for an agent and publisher. That is why I’m hoping this page will draw more people to my story, getting them interested in the message and ready for the book to be published, so I can share it with everyone.I would be remiss not to mention another, sadder “anniversary” which I heard of on my 30th birthday last year. Last year saw a busy, joyous celebration hosted by my brother Mike and his wife Tiffani at their house. Everyone gathered and made touching toasts as we celebrated ten years that we almost didn’t get together. It had been such a happy day for all of us as I reveled in the blessings I could so easily have missed out on, and as my loved ones celebrated how far we had all come from those tense days in the hospital ten years before. When I went outside to discover my car had been backed into, and a trembling teenager across the street, it didn’t even phase me. I had been in her scared shoes before, and I was riding too high to let anything get to me. At home that night, I told my husband Scott “Well, my car got run into and I puked up pink on the way home. Overall, one of the best birthdays I’ve had in a while!” There was another family that had lingered in the back of my mind that day, though.Earlier I had been on Facebook, as many friends and family had sweetly wished me a Happy Birthday. But I didn’t even make it to the posts on my Wall before I saw one on my Newsfeed that made me stop cold. A girl I had gone to high school with had posted a long, heart-wrenching tribute to her sister. Ten years ago that day her sister had been killed while riding cross-country on her bicycle with some friends. By all accounts that I’ve seen and heard, Rachel Speight was a wonderful, talented individual who had so much more to offer this world than I do. I will never understand why my family’s grief turned to excited joy eleven years ago, while her family’s grief has never gone away. My heart broke for her younger sister Abby and their parents as I read how their family had been forever changed ten years before and would never be the same. It’s the sort of thing that can make you feel very unworthy of the miracles you’ve been given. Rachel was a gifted singer with a beautiful voice. She gave back to the community, was attending Yale, and actually knew what she was going to do with her life. In many regards she was a much better person than I’ll ever be, and while I may never know why our fates weren’t switched on that day eleven years ago, I will always remember her (especially on that day), and the fact that my family was allowed to keep me while more deserving people were called Home before their loved ones were ready. With that in mind, I know I better not waste these amazing blessings, even when times seem tough. I ask anyone who reads this to please keep Rachel’s family in mind this, and every year on June 19th. Please say a prayer for them as they continue to grieve and live life in her shining memory that continues to affect others who weren’t even blessed enough to know her.

Another blessing for which I am immensely thankful, and another reason why I am still here, is the power of prayer. So many wonderful people began praying for my family and me when they heard I was in a coma and essentially at death’s door. Friends, family, friends of friends, friends of family, and people all over the world were lifting me up in prayer. A man my dad worked with belonged to a small gospel church somewhere in Texas, and the selfless, kind-hearted Christians there held two 24-hour candlelight vigils for a 20-year-old girl none of them had ever met. I will forever be indebted to those beautiful people for the time, prayers, and blessings they gave me.My mom often laughed that so many people were praying that it must have gotten so loud in Heaven that they said “I guess we better go check on this Jessica girl.” It obviously helped, because after two massive hemorrhaged brain aneurysms, a 2-week coma, and my intracranial pressure spiking into the sixties (another thing the doctors told my family people don’t survive), I managed to not only survive but keep the twisted personality and sick sense of humor my loved ones had always known. My habit of flipping off nurses ensured them of that much.The power of prayer allowed my loved ones to get to keep the “real me,” and I have used the gift of life given me to pray for others whenever possible. I know prayer’s true power, and will continue to offer it to others who are in need of their own divine help. Right now, one of my best friends from my freshman year in high school could use all the prayers he can get. You may have heard of the mass shooting that occurred here in west Houston recently. The man who bravely got his gun (which he was licensed to carry) and held off the shooter, saving other lives and being hit three times in the process, was my very good friend in high school. We stopped hanging out when I began dating someone who wasn’t too keen on me having a male best friend, even though he was always more of a big brother to me than anything. Anyway, having been shot three times – once in the shoulder, and breaking each leg - he now faces multiple surgeries, medical bills, lots of rehabilitation, and an uncertain future. Not only do I ask for prayers for Byron, but also for his beautiful wife, as she stands strong by her husband, and for their young son. They all have a long healing process ahead, but I know his kind, always jovial heart and God’s love will see them through this.

Welcome, and thank you for stumbling upon my blog about my tumultuous life and the invaluable lessons I’ve learned from it – all brought to you by a back-handed bitch-slap from Karma! In fact, that’s putting it nicely. I didn’t just get bitch-slapped by Karma…I got bitch-slapped, beat down, gut-checked and curb stomped by Karma. And that ol’ bitch still ain’t done with this girl!Please visit the “About” section to learn more of the backstory, and see what got me here. I have learned much during the decade following my survival of (more than) two would-be death sentences. I have completed my memoir about my experiences, in the hope that different aspects of my struggle and story could help many others through their own, whether yours was also caused by an aneurysm, or something less physical.My memoir begins with the fast-paced life I knew in the years before my first stroke, always surrounded by dirt bikes, race cars, and that euphoria-inducing “smell of race fuel in the morning.” The story then shifts forward a couple of years, to a time when the money, toys and race cars were all gone, and in their place a desperate, depressed life was being lived. I was blessed to always be surrounded by friends and family I loved, and the very fact that I was out partying with one of those friends the night before and morning of my 20th birthday kept me alive.We shudder to think what could have happened had I not been out with my friend Teri. Had I been at home that morning, my parents most likely would have just let me sleep in, being my birthday. The aneurysm would have hemorrhaged, I would have gone into the coma, and my parents would have gone upstairs later to find the unimaginable.While the love of family and friends (quite literally) kept me alive, the aforementioned depression with which I had battled for years led to a frequent binge-drinking habit and a 2-3 pack-a-day chain-smoking habit. Although my brain aneurysms were most likely congenital, as seems to be the case in general, I have determined through my own research after-the-fact that excessive alcohol and tobacco abuse can weaken and enlarge a preexisting problem. I concluded that my bad habits were what had caused the aneurysms to become as massive as they had, without rupturing years before on one of the many occasions I was thrown from a dirt bike, jarring my brain. On top of the alcohol and tobacco, I had been on birth control pills for years, which carry their own risk of stroke, and at the time I was popping diet pills, as I was at least forty pounds overweight and looking for an easy solution. I won’t name the pill, but suffice it to say, I was always an Anna Nicole Smith fan. I felt a kindred spirit in her, as a fellow Texas girl, and my heart broke for her when her beloved son died, followed so closely by her herself.That being said, it disturbs me to notice the rising trend of aneurysms and strokes in the young, most likely often caused by the same bad health choices that aided to mine. I am hoping that through the publishing of my memoir and information I provide on this page, I can urge and steer others away from those detrimental factors, especially those who are of the age to make the most difference in their health. A recent survey conducted by the CDC confirmed the sharp rise in the rate of strokes among young people, with doctors citing the nationally common health risks of obesity and high blood pressure as possible contributors to that rise. [http://www.everydayhealth.com/stroke/why-are-stroke-rates-rising-among-young-people.aspx]I wish to add my own belief that increasingly reckless living among young people is also contributing to said increase in stroke rates. It saddens me to see that, despite the abundance of information with which they are inundated, teenagers continue to make the same stupid decision I did in taking up smoking. I knew my generation was stupid to smoke, having been provided with all the health warnings our parents and grandparents had been less aware of, but to see that tobacco use continues to rise in this generation just shocks me. You haven’t gotten the picture yet? Three of my four grandparents died from smoking-related illnesses, and had to suffer through their end years. Haven’t you had to witness someone you love suffer? Maybe being too young to see my Grandpa suffering until his death had hindered the message from sinking in with me, even though I cried myself to sleep at night as a child because smoking had taken away my Poppa before I ever got to meet him. But after watching the Grandma I adored suffer and be taken away, and after two strokes flipped my life completely upside-down, I would never touch a cigarette again.It seems that the advent of e-cigarettes is aiding to the rise in tobacco use with this generation [http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/youth_data/tobacco_use/], but I hope that seeing someone for whom many dreams and physical abilities were dashed upon the age of twenty will cause some teens and young adults to stop and think about that new bad habit they’ve picked up, or are curious about.If there is something else to which I hope my memoir can speak, and another struggle with which I hope it can help people, it’s suicide. Another rising rate which saddens me is the noticeable rise in suicide rates, especially among girls and young women. [http://www.cbsnews.com/news/suicide-rates-rise-especially-for-one-group/]As you learn in my memoir, I faced a mental breakdown towards the end of high school, the result of a break-up with someone who was never worthy of the suicidal thoughts that followed in the wake of his absence. I realize too late to help myself that the number of teenage boys actually worthy of the slavish devotion young girls give them is so small as to barely merit mentioning. Most will not become worthy of such adoration until their 30’s or 40’s, if ever. However, if I thought suicide looked tempting in those stress-filled teenage days, I had no idea how tempting it would look when I awoke to find myself forever trapped in what I believed to be a lesser body. With my family going through its own struggles, it would look even more tempting on the nights I laid awake with fears of missing out on my biggest dreams clouding my thoughts. While the tears always fell when I sat down to the piano, no longer able to play the left hand’s part of the music, while my throat choked and eyes welled at the sight of motocross on television, and while I now felt so left out of the racing world in which I’d always felt at home, it was thoughts of losing my oldest dream that tormented me. Since I was very little, the dream which mattered most to me was becoming a wife and mother. It was at only 2 or 3 years old that, as Mom tucked me in, I looked up with the big blue eyes of my youth and sighed “I just can’t wait for my babies to come out.”I have already decided that my daughter will be home-schooled if I’m blessed enough to have one and she ever utters those words. However, after my second post-strokes break-up I was beginning to doubt that I would ever find anyone who could see past the limp, cane, (leg brace, at the time), and drawn-up arm to love and appreciate the person within. Mom would try to reassure me that the “right one” was out there somewhere, but I always replied that whoever it was “got run over by a Mack truck a long time ago.”I’m fortunate that Mom turned out to be the one that was right, when I met and married the man who loves me unconditionally for the person I am, sees me as less injured than I do, and constantly raises me up to believe I can do more than I think possible. But none of the blessings I now enjoy would be possible if I had ever given in to those thoughts of suicide. That is why it is so important for me to show people, especially young people, that though your life may look horrible now, with no end in sight, it will ALWAYS get better, and in the end you will be thankful for the strength you gain getting through it.

Below is a picture of me just before my 10-year high school reunion in 2014. I was thrilled that I'd not only lost weight, but the surgery I'd had 4 years previously had taken away the need to wear a leg brace to prevent spasticity & dystonia from making my foot kick inward. I could finally wear boots again, I was so excited! Then, my asshole cats peed on the boots. And my lime green Nikes. Karma strikes again in the form of furry shitheads!

Author

JP MacFarland is the author of Hope Alive: A Coming of Age Tale Brought About By a Back-handed Bitch-slap From Karma. Native Texans, she and her husband live outside of their hometown of Houston, with their crazy fur babies. Every day brings new challenges to face and figure out with one arm. It's a crazy, one-armed life!